Our school smells like a bakery

Today was another fun day at Ohana with many different activities for us to do. Downstairs we baked a chocolate cake for “shhhhhhhh”; we can’t tell you her name but she is a teacher and it is her birthday on Friday. Can you guess?

We mixed the powder in a bowl, with half a cup of water, one egg and one tablespoon of oil. We each had a turn to mix the ingredients together with a spoon and then Nanako used an electric beater and she made it into a beautiful smooth mixture. We poured it into the baking tray and now our classroom smells and like a bakery. We even had a chance to lick the mixture just one time with a small spoon (except Vincent as he is allergic to eggs). Yummmmmm!

We are so looking forward to eating it but were satisfied with a little taste today. During the morning, we painted with black ink and “Shuji” brushes on special paper. The last time we did this activity, it was specifically to learn about what happens on the New Year in Japan and how to write New Year in kanji. Today we had the freedom to paint which was fun.

Another thing that we did today was with a scale. We learnt that the more things that you place inside the container on top of the school; the heavier the bowl gets and the more the orange hand on the dial moves. We put fruit and vegetables in the bowl and then added many other things to see what would be the heaviest. Outside in the park, we learnt inside and outside. We drew some large circles with our teachers and stood inside the circle and then outside. We played a game using inside and outside. FJ drew a face inside one of the circles.

We did some cutting but this time we tried to cut out on a long straight line and a circle. The circle was a little challenging however Tokutaro and Abiya managed to cut along the straight line with accuracy.  We sang songs about the initial sound of our names and looked at all of our names on our flash cards. We sang “If you’re wearing red, stand up…….and go and wash your hands” when we were getting ready for snack time. We used different colours and had to look carefully at our clothes to see what colour we were wearing. Tokutaro remembered that his pants were grey. We also learnt how to use the correct grammar when we are talking about our pants e.g. “My pants are grey”. We played a colour recognition game and a matching game using the coloured circles puzzle.

Upstairs we completed all of our birthday hearts for this week and are all set for the party on Friday. Last week Jenny and Shoko brought back a pile of rocks from the park, so today they cleaned them. They dipped them in soapy water and sponged them off to dry them. Their original plan was to build a castle with them however they may change their minds when the rocks are dry. Sean and Beckett had a great time with the trains while Nico tried to put the letters in alphabetical order while listening to the song. The “l, m, n, o, p” are sung a little fast so these ones were a little challenging to place in the correct order. FJ and Jamie put the chef’s hats on and started to prepare a meal for all of us.

In the library we read “The little red hen to the rescue”. Once we had finished reading the book, we decided to count the number of wheels on the train. In the book it showed four wheels on one side so we worked out that there must be four wheels on the other side as well and four plus four equals eight. We then moved to the activity table and had a selection of 3D modes of transport and chose which one we wanted to draw. We had trucks, buses, cars, helicopters, planes, motorbikes, taxis etc. We used lead pencils to draw them.

We did something really difficult at the tables using a saw and a long tube. We decided to cut the tube into small tubes which could then be used as wheels. We measured the small tubes into 2cms each and then used the large saw to cut them. We cut eight in total so far and worked out how many different modes of transport we can make with eight wheels. We could make two cars as they each need four wheels; four motorbikes as they each need two wheels; one train as it uses eight wheels for one carriage and two airplanes as they use four wheels each. It was great fun working these mathematical problems out. We sat at the table with the small tubes working the answers out to all of these problems.

Oh what fun we have learning through play!

Love always Shelley, Darren, Nanako, Ayaka, Christine, Goh, Liezel and Sabine